1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to an electrophotographic toner for use in electrophotographic apparatuses which utilize an electrophotographic process such as copying machines, printers, facsimiles, and the like, a production method thereof, an electrophotographic developer, and an image-forming process using the toner.
2. Description of the Related Art
Many electrophotographic methods are already known. Generally, a fixed image is formed after undergoing the plural steps in which a latent image is electrostatically formed by various means on a surface of a photosensitive body (latent image carrier) which utilizes a photoconductive substance, the formed latent image is developed using electrophotographic toner (hereinafter, referred to as simply “toner”) to form a toner image, the toner image on the surface of the photosensitive body is transferred onto a surface of a recording material such as paper or the like, and this transferred image is fixed by compression or thermocompression and solvent vapor, etc. Toner remaining on the surface of the photosensitive body is cleaned, as required, by various methods and is again supplied for the aforementioned plural steps.
As a fixing technique for fixing a transfer image which has been transferred onto a surface of a recording material, a heat roll fixing method of inserting a transferrable body onto which a toner image has been transferred between a pair of rolls composed of a heating roll and a pressure roll to fix the image is common. In addition, as a similar technique, a technique in which one or both of the rolls is substituted with a belt is also known. Compared to other fixing means, these techniques provide an image that is firmly fixed at high speed, have a high energy efficiency, and cause minimal damage to the environment due to volatilization of solvent or the like.
On the other hand, a technique for fixing toner using less energy is desired in order to reduce the amount of energy usage in copying machines and printers. For this reason, there is a strong demand for an electrophotographic toner which can be fixed at a lower temperature.